Do you think the term bait dog will ever disappear? You see a shelter dog that has a few scratches or punctures and it obviously had to have been a bait dog, especially if it looks pittish. I know we have the H$U$ to thank for the term, but how can we get rid of it?

"Remember - every time your dog gets somewhere on a tight leash *a fairy dies and it's all your fault.* Think of the fairies." http://www.positivepetzine.com"

Though it gives the Wiener a great nickname...since he now has a scar from Sypher (the boxer)...we call him our bait dog. Tell him we're going to dangle him in front of the pit bulls to make them bloodthirsty.

"I don't have any idea if my dogs respect me or not, but they're greedy and I have their stuff." -- Patty Ruzzo

"Dogs don't want to control people. They want to control their own lives." --John Bradshaw

I don't really see it going away any time soon. I hear too many rescues and adoptive owners saying with certainty that their dog was used as a bait dog. All the sympathy garnering stories really annoy me to be honest. I'd rather advertise a dog up for adoption for what it IS now, not what it is assumed to have been.

Every dog with a scratch was a bait dog, or was fought. Every shy dog was beaten. Every aggressive was abused.

The sob stories sell, and people get an ego boost by "saving" a dog from whatever horrible story that was concocted for it. It's like the "Basenji x Pit Bull" mixes in the shelter. Really? One of the rarest breeds in the country is out making mutts? And Pit Bull mutts to boot.

It's all about the story. not reality.

ACTUAL bait dogs are killed or horribly disfigured, they don't have a couple of scratches and a few little scars.

The ass we got Ruby from proudly told us about her fighting off two adult bitches who "got out of their kennels" and instead of going after each other, they decided to break into her kennel to kick the crap out of her. They literally ripped both of her ears off half off her head, and she has permanent shoulder damage - and she was able to fight back. Dogs that are tied/ restrained/ whatever have parts removed. However people get VERY offended when you point that out to them....

Michelle

Inside me is a thin woman trying to get out. I usually shut the bitch up with a martini.

which is why dogs featured in news stories, etc always have a waiting list for adopters. I always thought that the shelters should make up sob stories for hard-to-place dogs (the ever present black mixes)...so they get adopted sooner!

But this goes along with one of my fears that if one of my dogs ever got loose and picked up by a bleeding heart that they wouldn't look for me because my dogs have scars, ribs showing and are often dirty from playing! Dogs with short coats that hang out and play with herding dogs have a lot of scars to show for that play! Odd got Trill and Score in one day earlier this year...Score still has his scar, Trill's hides in her brindling.

"I don't have any idea if my dogs respect me or not, but they're greedy and I have their stuff." -- Patty Ruzzo

"Dogs don't want to control people. They want to control their own lives." --John Bradshaw

TheRedQueen wrote:But this goes along with one of my fears that if one of my dogs ever got loose and picked up by a bleeding heart that they wouldn't look for me because my dogs have scars, ribs showing and are often dirty from playing! Dogs with short coats that hang out and play with herding dogs have a lot of scars to show for that play! Odd got Trill and Score in one day earlier this year...Score still has his scar, Trill's hides in her brindling.

I think this all the time!! Luna is muscular, but so lean-- bony, ribby, and zero fat, but rippling abs across her side (I'm totally jealous and in awe, actually)-- and because her coat is so sparse and short, every scar shows (scars that she got flinging herself through the bushes like a nut). People who don't know any better would think she was starved and beaten... She eats twice as much as the other dogs just to keep up with her metabolism. River is half again her size and eats half as much.

Which is why I try not to be too judgy when I find a dog that APPEARS to be neglected. Unfortunately, I'm then proved right when the "owners" can't even be bothered to call the pound to look for the dog, much less put up flyers or place ads.

"In these bodies, we will live; in these bodies we will die.Where you invest your love, you invest your life." --Marcus Mumford

Luckily Puzzle is a dark brindle...so she hides her scars (she's also got freakish-alien-fast-healing-powers) well. Because she has super, super tight skin (we guess she's part pit bull/part whippet)...so she just *tears* open on anything. I glue her a lot, because otherwise I'd be in debt getting her stitched up!

"I don't have any idea if my dogs respect me or not, but they're greedy and I have their stuff." -- Patty Ruzzo

"Dogs don't want to control people. They want to control their own lives." --John Bradshaw

I am lucky that mine don't have any scars on their faces (especially since Blue is currently underweight . . . man scars and skinny would be awful for him!).

Wally was scarred on his face (a Greyhound). And not even in conjunction with the scars, we would be out for a walk and people would give us their sympathy for all of the abuse that he incurred while racing.

No.

Wally raced because he was bred to do it and he wanted to. I saw it first hand. He was a WORKING DOG. He also was treated well at his racing kennel, as I deduced from emailing back and forth with his kennel manager. He had facial scars because he took charge of the yard (most racing kennels have 20-80 dogs out at a time), and even through his basket muzzle (they are put out with muzzles on) he still got into tiffs.

But he was never fought. And he was not abused. People need to think a bit more with their actual BRAINS.

"All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another." -Anatole France

UGH! this is from another forum - the preface to the bottom-link refers to New Mexico - stupid idiots!

We have some dog fighters here who are using bait dogs and we are finding them dead on the side of the road. I HATE the term bait dogs because rescues use every dog who has ever been in a fight and say they are bait dogs..... Unfortunately we really are seeing bait dogs in my town. A bunch of Amature wannabe dog fighters using bullies for fighting dogs..... What's next? using geese as fighting cocks? SMH

Here is the story, Mercy the recent bait dog victim, was found tossed on the hwy with her muzzle wired shut, obvious fighting scars, and she had been shot in the face and vulva.....